


Just a Couple of Kids

by Intoxicatedstarlight



Category: HTTYD, How to Train Your Dragon (Movies), race to the edge - Fandom
Genre: #I am trash, #adorable, #angst, #hiccstrid, #this is total hiccstrid I swear, #total drabble, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-19
Updated: 2018-02-19
Packaged: 2019-03-21 03:36:15
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,494
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13732305
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Intoxicatedstarlight/pseuds/Intoxicatedstarlight
Summary: “Aren’t you going to say anything?” She asked again, biting her lip. Give her a battle field, unbeatable odds. Give her a thousand dragon hunters and no weapon of her own and she would still feel less vulnerable than she does now.-Or, the one where Astrid is uncertain about what she wants for her and Hiccup's future.Drabble set in 5 x 02





	Just a Couple of Kids

Astrid heard it first from Ruffnut. Of all people. She’d been sitting in her hut, carefully sharpening her axe, when the other blonde had stumbled into her room and fallen on the floor.  
At first, Astrid didn’t react and let her lie there. But when it had been a full minute of Ruffnut lying curled up in a ball, without any kind of explanation, Astrid’s patience reached its end.  
“Ruffnut, what the hell are you doing in my hut?”  
“Shhh.”  
“Excuse me?” Astrid stood up and marched towards her, ready to force the unwanted visitor out if need be. “I have one rule about my hut: no one comes in.”  
Ruffnut opened one eye. “What about you?”  
Astrid gritted her teeth. “Of course I can come into my own hut.”  
Ruffnut narrowed her eyes. “Okay, well what about that time you went blind? And we were all gathered around your bed, worrying that you were going to die, and-”  
“Ruffnut!” Astrid snapped, grabbing Ruffnut’s collar and starting to yank her towards the door “There are exceptions, like when I physically cannot get inside here myself-“  
“I saw Hiccup come in here the other day.”  
Astrid stopped, dropping Ruffnut suddenly, her cheeks going slightly red. “Yeah, well, he’s our leader. Again, it’s an exception.” She stalked back over to her bed and started sharpening her axe again.  
“Fine.” Knowing she the immediate threat of Astrid kicking her out was momentarily over, Ruffnut glanced around the room.  
“So is that axe your betrothal gift for Hiccup, or-”  
The axe clattered to the floor. “EXCUSE ME?”  
“SHHH! Please don’t talk so loud. I’m hiding from Tuffnut.”  
Astrid raised an eyebrow. “Will I regret it if I ask why?”  
“Well, you see, he and chicken got into a fight. I took chicken’s side, and now he’s angry and think we both prefer each other, so he’s decided he’s going to become a bear for a week, but bears can smell out humans, so I’m worried he’ll smell me and come find me- anyway, is that gift for Hiccup?”  
“Um,” Astrid said, trying to work her way through the nonsense. “…no. Why would I be giving him a gift? It’s not his birthday.”  
“Playing dumb isn’t a good look on you, sister.” Ruffnut sidled up to her. “A gift for your betrothal, obviously. It’s even obvious to me.”  
Astrid looked down at her lap. “Hiccup and I aren’t betrothed, Ruff.”  
“Really?” Ruffnut sounded genuinely surprised. “That’s a shame. Poor Hiccup will be so surprised, to think he even asked his father for his mother’s betrothal necklace to give to you. I always knew he was slightly deranged, that one. You could still marry him, though. A little insanity is a nice little spice up in family life. Maybe if you two aren’t getting engaged, I’ll go talk to him again. He’s quite-”  
“Ruffnut.” Astrid was trying to remain calm, holding onto the edges of her sanity like a sail clung to the mast in the wind. “Backtrack. What was that about a necklace?”  
“Oh, the necklace?” Ruffnut pulled out a dagger and started cleaning her toenails with it. “It was Hiccup’s mother’s, and he wants to give it to you to indicate your betrothal.”  
“No, no, no,” Astrid started to pace. Why did this have to happen?  
“Woah, there. Hiccup’s a bit gangly and could do with a few fewer baths, sure, but he’s not all that bad.”  
“Of course, he’s not all that bad,” Astrid sighed. “I mean he’s heroic, unassuming, he has a night fury, he can fly with a suit made of yak hides, for Hella’s sake, he has a sword that ignites on command,” she fell to the floor, letting her legs buckle underneath her, “and, after all that, he’s going to be the next chief of Berk.”  
An odd, bear-like growl sounded from outside her hut. Ruffnut stood up on alert, and called back.  
“Wasn’t the point not to let him know where you were?”  
Ruffnut mocked her voice. “You seem so smart, Astrid. Obviously, that was a peace-making growl.”  
“Obviously.”  
Ruffnut grinned manically. “See ya!” she exited Astrid’s hut at full speed, hitting the door way but still carrying on.  
“Bye,” Astrid sighed, pulling her knees into her chest and wondering how in Thor she was going to break Hiccup’s heart. 

The next day became a stealth mission. Before she’d even been back from her routine training with Stormfly, both Fishlegs and Snotlout had mentioned something about a betrothal ( Fishlegs in a congratulating way, and Snotlout in a kissey-kissey-you’re-disgusting sort of way.) When Hiccup and her paths finally crossed, she was a nervous mess.  
“Trader Jorgenson sent us a Terror mail…” Hiccup read it out to the group. Astrid stood silently at the doorway, arms crossed tightly as if in an effort to keep herself from straying from a soldier’s mindset.  
Hiccup had smiled at her when she first walked in – an honest, happy – though slight nervous smile and it made it feel like all the butterflies in her stomach had just died. He was so hopeful and kind… and sensitive. She’d always loved that about him, but in that way, he was the opposite of her, and she had no idea what was the proper way to let him down gently. 

By the time they returned from the Northern Training markets, Astrid was happy to return to her cabin and avoid all contact that way. But first Stormfly needed cleaning, feeding, and so did she, and then she had her exercise routine – all that took twice as long as usual, as she had to keep stopping and ducking whenever she had footsteps at the peril of being cornered into that conversation with her boyfriend.  
She was finally tiptoeing her way across the island when she saw him coming towards her, looking down at something small in his hands as he strode across the boardwalk, his metal leg making a small clack sound as it came in contact with the nails holding the bridge together.  
Slowly, and soundlessly, Astrid turned on her heel, walking back up to the meeting house before he could see her.  
“Astrid!”  
Shit.  
She turned, trying to put a smile on her face as he came running up behind her. “Astrid, wait a sec-”  
“Sorry, Hiccup, got to run,” she made a huge fake yawn. “So tired after all the adventure today. Got to get to bed.”  
Hiccup put his hand on his hip. “Makes sense. All that trying to avoid me must be really exhausting.”  
“Mmhmm, you’re right, so if I just-”  
Astrid was half turned around when she realised what she’d said. “Um, I…”  
“Haven’t been avoiding me?” Hiccup looked annoyed, but from his tone of voice, she could tell that he was more hurt than angry. Which was worse. “what about ‘not wanting to keep Trader Johann waiting? About Stormfly’s ‘feisty’ flying? You deciding to split off with Fishlegs? Barely even talking to me after you saved both Snotlout’s and my lives?”  
“Well, when you put it like that…”  
“Astrid. Please. Just tell me the truth.”  
She could see now that his eyes were slightly red- as if he’d been trying not to cry. Her heart sunk further inside her chest.  
“If you don’t want to be with me anymore, I’d rather you just told me. You don’t…owe me anything.” He said is so awkwardly, so vulnerably. For a moment, she hated herself.  
And then, Astrid laughed. She tried to hold it back. But it ripped out of her, loud and hysterical and utterly unfunny. “I don’t owe you anything? For the love of Thor Hiccup! Of course, I owe you something. You’re the pride of Berk and its future chief, you’ve introduced us to dragons and currently, you’re my… Captain, Leader, whatever title you refuse to give yourself. That’s the whole problem.”  
Hiccup blinked in surprise. Whatever he had prepared himself for, this wasn’t it. “So what, you’re saying ‘it’s not you, it’s me?’”  
“No, I-” how had this gone so wrong, so quickly? “You’re too good for me Hiccup, don’t you see?”  
There was a pause.  
“Have you been hanging out with the twins? Because you sound insane.”  
He was breathless now, with a kind of anger she had rarely had directed at her – once, that was all she could remember when she hadn’t told him about Heather being a spy. The same anger and confusion and betrayal was on his face, and this time, it wasn’t as easy to explain away.  
“Ugh. You have no idea.” Astrid sat down, letting her feet dangle off the edge of the bridge. She couldn’t do this properly when she looked at him. “It’s just my parents…” she trailed off.  
“Are you saying your parents don’t approve of us?”  
It was a strange thought. Astrid couldn’t remember a time when her parents had ever actually been in the same room as Hiccup, apart from in whole-tribe gatherings. They were good warriors, not at the bottom of the heap, but not within Stoick’s inner circle, either.  
“It’s the opposite. The Polar opposite.”  
He lowered himself to be sitting down beside her, mimicking her posture, as always, willing to listen, no matter if it wasn’t what he wanted to hear. He was so perfect sometimes that it aggravated her.  
“You still don’t make any sense.” He said, softer this time. He seemed to have caught onto something that was going on. That was his skill, though – looking at things and figuring out how they were broken, what had happened to them, how to fix them and make them better. Sometimes it unnerved her, how he seems to be able to pick up her skin and look under it, read all of her secrets. Sometimes, though, she just lets herself succumb to it.  
“I’m the perfect daughter, Hiccup. I know you think that I have myself all figured out, that I know exactly who I am,” Hiccup made a sound like he might protest, but she carried on. “…but it’s not that simple. I’m who my parents have always raised me to be – a warrior, decisive, dedicated. I’ve done everything they’ve ever wanted, and so, everything I’ve achieved has been for them. To help honour them, make the Hofferson name something to be in awe of.”  
She half looked as him through the periphery of her vision, conscious of how close their hands were between them.  
“But this, us… you and me and the edge, it was always for me. I love you, Hiccup, but the second we’re engaged, my family… they’ll just blow it out of the water. It won’t be that I’m engaged to you, because you’re not you, to them, you’re Stoick’s son. To them I’ll be engaged to the future chief.” She daren’t slow down, leave him a moment to talk, before it was all out. She hadn’t even understood all her own thoughts before now, before they came falling out in unstructured sentences.  
“They’ll be pushing me to marry you as soon as possible, so that they’ll have influence. Not in a cruel way, but just in… their way.” She swallowed, trying to force the rest of the words to come out. She and Hiccup hadn’t talked about the rest of it, which maybe in itself showed they weren’t ready to be betrothed.  
“And then,” she took a breath, “as the chief’s wife, I’m expected to have children and be good and calm and stay out of danger. And I just… maybe one day, I’ll want that. But right now, I’m 18. We still have the archipelago and a thousand enemies and a million adventures before we settle. And I know, for you,” she glanced sideways and gave him a small smile, not looking him in the eyes,  
“for you it’s not about settling down but about being there for each other, but for me… it means something different, even without the whole parents thing.”  
“And if I’m older and I’m ready, maybe then I’ll be strong enough to withstand them, to stop them and certainty and routine ruining what we have. But for now, I don’t want them to touch it. I want it to just be ours. Don’t you understand?”  
She forced herself to look up at him finally, and found him staring at her. His green eyes were always dazzling in this light, thousands of thoughts and ideas flying past like a storm behind them. She never could figure out what it is he was going to do – it frustrated her just as much as it made her love him.  
“Aren’t you going to say anything?” She asked again, biting her lip. Give her a battle field, unbeatable odds. Give her a thousand dragon hunters and no weapon of her own and she would still feel less vulnerable than she does now.  
All too slowly, his hand slipped further in hers where they rested between them. “I love you too, Astrid Hofferson.” He smiled slowly, and squeezed her hand, and strung the necklace around her neck, despite the wrinkling of her nose. “Whatever that means. Whatever you want it to mean, remember?”  
Astrid rolled her eyes, but she couldn’t fight the smile that itched at her lips, as she lifted a hand to cup the necklace. “You’re a dork.”  
“Maybe so,” he lifted a hand to brush her hair behind her ear, “and you, milady, are beautiful. As long as we’re together, it doesn’t matter what we call ourselves.” He looked down at her lips.  
“Don’t go getting any ideas,” she teased, waggling her eyebrows at him.  
“Ideas? What ideas could I possibly have?” He asked, completely serious. “Oh, do you mean one like this?”  
Astrid had a thousand cut-throat replies she could have made, but as Hiccup leant in to kiss her, she forgot all of them.  
“That,” she said, as he leant back, “Was one of your better ideas.”  
Hiccup chuckled, and turned so she could nest her head in his neck. “I’m glad to hear it. I have a few more like it.”  
“You could tell me.”  
Hiccup shook his head. “You’ll just have to wait and see.”  
Astrid sighed. “You are a dork.”  
He smiled down at her, a bright thing that lit up every corner of his face. “Yes. But I’m your dork.”  
Astrid smiled. “That you are.”  
The necklace around her neck didn’t feel like the shackle she thought it would. And she knew – he knew – it wasn’t a betrothal gift, not anymore. It was a different kind of promise.  
Astrid knew she loved Hiccup. She hoped what they had would last forever. Maybe it wouldn’t, though, and that would be alright too. Because he’d always be here, by her side. What they had might not be for always, but it was for now, and on that summer night when they were 18 and in the middle of a war, that was enough for her.

**Author's Note:**

> This is a drabble I have been craving to write since I first watched 5 x 02. Something about Astrid's eagerness to get betrothed seemed slightly out of character for her, with her feisty independent spirit (no matter how much she loved Hiccup). I was expecting this to be more angsty, but Hiccup is so goddamned understanding and adorable and he would only be sad, not angry, and I felt bad for him. So yeah, this is... what it is. Which is something I have no clue about? 
> 
> The real question though: do actual kids watch this series? Or is it just us guys who can't let go of these characters and our childhoods?


End file.
